Populated alerts I would say 30, not 60. From 2169 to 3444 is not 60% higher, it's a difference of about a third. So Populated Alerts = +30%, Unpopulated alerts +150%.
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Thargoid invasion - Next target systems?
- Thread starter Aleks Zuno
- Start date
You may need a new calculator there—I am quite sure that 3444 divided by 2169 is 1.5878, or approximately 60% more!
Yes I just miscalculated, a difference of 1275 samples is 59%, rounded up. Brainfade moment.
Which would put Njorog at over 11000.
Orthrus hunting might work but they are only in NHSS4s which are variable in how many spawn and how often. If you get lucky and get lots in a row, so be it, if you're waiting about for signals not so much.
Taking out the Controls that cause Alerts will need some prioritising as well in order to save more Controls that will be harder still to clear - unless they have upped the value of combat or something. If they have, it's about time really.
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Another big issue with Orthrus hunting is that it doesn't seem to work well with multiple players. Only one person can see the signal and if their teammates try to use nav-lock to drop at the same time, they end up hundreds of kilometers away and don't even get to reach the Orthrus before it either dies or flees. If they drop manually they risk destabilising the Orthrus AI, leading to multiple EMPs (that only one player gets any warning about) that trigger a full shield recharge and make it impossible to take out the target before it jumps away.
Yes, this certainly doesn't help either. Alerts really are their own thing, not just "a bit like Controls only different."
Indeed; on this point—
Thinking back to our first attacks upon M. Hadad, that was exactly how it worked without Alert support at the time; all Alerts simply became Controls. We prevented them if we could via elimination of attackers, or if not we took simply another Control system elsewhere around the Maelstrom, one-for-one.
I would love very much to help with the empty Alerts, but that 150% increase is so disproportionately high¹ that the best thing we can hope to do is as before and exactly as you noted, attacking the attackers and introducing one-for-one attacks on Control systems if not all Alerts can be addressed. We are a bit committed with M. Leigong at the moment, although if the inhabited targets are unchanged then you can expect zero new Alerts here next week!
M. Hadad has become a big problem now; the options are really:
1. High compared to the shorter respite; those Alert strengths are close enough to Control strengths, at which point the halved respite is now a very steep price incurred just for favouring Alerts, such that INIV definitely would perform one-for-one attacks instead.
Thinking back to our first attacks upon M. Hadad, that was exactly how it worked without Alert support at the time; all Alerts simply became Controls. We prevented them if we could via elimination of attackers, or if not we took simply another Control system elsewhere around the Maelstrom, one-for-one.
I would love very much to help with the empty Alerts, but that 150% increase is so disproportionately high¹ that the best thing we can hope to do is as before and exactly as you noted, attacking the attackers and introducing one-for-one attacks on Control systems if not all Alerts can be addressed. We are a bit committed with M. Leigong at the moment, although if the inhabited targets are unchanged then you can expect zero new Alerts here next week!
M. Hadad has become a big problem now; the options are really:
- Hold the present space quite expensively as Control, just less expensively than as Alert.
- Receive heavy, committed Spire support and clear it all, which we can if everyone is with us!
- Retreat, leaving Montioch and Omumba, and holding back at Muruidooges again.
1. High compared to the shorter respite; those Alert strengths are close enough to Control strengths, at which point the halved respite is now a very steep price incurred just for favouring Alerts, such that INIV definitely would perform one-for-one attacks instead.
Do note that the risk at Omumba is not that it would be allowed to fall (I suspect it wouldn’t, whether or not the samplers work there or no), rather that its defence would divert large amounts of players away from Spires every time it went Invasion. The bugs really didnt like us neutralising a Maelstrom, it seems.
Just stating what's worked for me so far... but whatever is causing it, it shouldn't take scrying chicken entrails and ensuring the alignment of Jupiter with Neptune to determine which rescue ships offer missions at a given point in time and which don't.
It's certainly nothing to do with proximity to available mission targets like it should be :/
(Tangentially, it'd be great if these missions weren't limited to just rescue ships, rather, available at any human colony within, say, 20Ly of a relevant target system... but i have cynical suspicions as to why that's not the case...)
To be in the clear here, are you talking about the reactivations available in post-Thargoid recovery systems, or the ones that go from alerts to controlled systems with military settlements?
Reactivations from post- thargoid recovery systems... though that includes missions to just deliver repair goods, since its all missions that disappear, not just reactivation missions.
Right. Still not sure I understand the relation to rescue megaships… as I don’t remember them offering missions to recovery systems at any point in the past.
Anyway, I might check to see if last week’s recovery systems have anything now, then, instead of some stupid thing in this game yet again not working as it says it should.
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That was a, mistake, sorry.
Brain was thinking "proximity to rescue ships" and turned into that.
Sounds like a thing mine would do too.
Are there any concerns to be had that there might be a possible relation to a sudden and unexpected difficulty increase while the one year anniversary of the war is next week… on a Thursday?
Or my brain’s overthinking that, too. Given that it’s the second-last day of the month, it would also coincide with when the end-of-month war summary is released…
Victories in HIP 9643, Col 285 Sectors ZT-F b12-4 and PM-B b14-4, and Arietis Sector XJ-R b4-3!
The apparent Control strength change predicted Arietis Sector XJ-R b4-3 well enough; with ongoing peripheral progress and a few extra units it ended at ~5% over. The modest boost at Arietis Sector AQ-P b5-0 was another test, and it corroborates the result that inhabited Control systems appear unchanged.
With peripheral progress at M. Leigong ongoing, we will start dividing attacks between Arietis Sector AQ-P b5-0 and Obassi Osaw!
Peripheries at 08:40 26th November 3309:
Five systems with 48% — Indra 19–21 Ly, 2 inhabited, 666–1190 strength
Three systems with 36% — Leigong 15–16 Ly, 1 matrix + 2 inhabited, 7252–8666 strength
Alerts:
Obamumbo Alert 94% *95.5% — Indra 19 Ly, 10 Ls starport, 17 Ls outpost, 10 Ls planet
HIP 21261 Alert 54% — Indra 20 Ly, 18 Ls outpost, 285 Ls planet, Peripheral system
Scythia Alert 42% — Indra 20 Ly, 270k Ls outpost, Peripheral system
HIP 7277 Alert 40% *40.5% — Leigong 17 Ly, 580 Ls outpost, 152 Ls planet, Peripheral system
Evictions:
97 i Tauri Control 88% — Indra 21 Ly, 471 strength
Lei Hsini Control 82% — Indra 21 Ly, 711 strength, Peripheral system
HIP 22524 Control 74% — Indra 20 Ly, 1190 strength, Peripheral system
Clean-up:
Arietis Sector KM-W c1-14 Alert 78% — Leigong 25 Ly, Peripheral system
Arietis Sector WJ-R b4-2 Alert 72% — Leigong 21 Ly, Peripheral system
Col 285 Sector KW-M c7-31 Alert 70% — Hadad 20 Ly, Peripheral system
Col 285 Sector OG-E b12-1 Matrix 64% — Thor 23 Ly
Arietis Sector FG-Y d38 Alert 56% — Leigong 20 Ly, Peripheral system
Arietis Sector XJ-R b4-2 Alert 56% — Leigong 21 Ly, Peripheral system
Arietis Sector YE-R b4-3 Matrix 36% *37.5% — Leigong 15 Ly
Notably, the margin by which this earlier statement was true has become even wider:
The apparent Control strength change predicted Arietis Sector XJ-R b4-3 well enough; with ongoing peripheral progress and a few extra units it ended at ~5% over. The modest boost at Arietis Sector AQ-P b5-0 was another test, and it corroborates the result that inhabited Control systems appear unchanged.
With peripheral progress at M. Leigong ongoing, we will start dividing attacks between Arietis Sector AQ-P b5-0 and Obassi Osaw!
Peripheries at 08:40 26th November 3309:
Five systems with 48% — Indra 19–21 Ly, 2 inhabited, 666–1190 strength
Three systems with 36% — Leigong 15–16 Ly, 1 matrix + 2 inhabited, 7252–8666 strength
Alerts:
Obamumbo Alert 94% *95.5% — Indra 19 Ly, 10 Ls starport, 17 Ls outpost, 10 Ls planet
HIP 21261 Alert 54% — Indra 20 Ly, 18 Ls outpost, 285 Ls planet, Peripheral system
Scythia Alert 42% — Indra 20 Ly, 270k Ls outpost, Peripheral system
HIP 7277 Alert 40% *40.5% — Leigong 17 Ly, 580 Ls outpost, 152 Ls planet, Peripheral system
Evictions:
97 i Tauri Control 88% — Indra 21 Ly, 471 strength
Lei Hsini Control 82% — Indra 21 Ly, 711 strength, Peripheral system
HIP 22524 Control 74% — Indra 20 Ly, 1190 strength, Peripheral system
Clean-up:
Arietis Sector KM-W c1-14 Alert 78% — Leigong 25 Ly, Peripheral system
Arietis Sector WJ-R b4-2 Alert 72% — Leigong 21 Ly, Peripheral system
Col 285 Sector KW-M c7-31 Alert 70% — Hadad 20 Ly, Peripheral system
Col 285 Sector OG-E b12-1 Matrix 64% — Thor 23 Ly
Arietis Sector FG-Y d38 Alert 56% — Leigong 20 Ly, Peripheral system
Arietis Sector XJ-R b4-2 Alert 56% — Leigong 21 Ly, Peripheral system
Arietis Sector YE-R b4-3 Matrix 36% *37.5% — Leigong 15 Ly
Notably, the margin by which this earlier statement was true has become even wider:
Akbakara will be done this evening.
Well done SNPX! Between M. Leigong and M. Oya, it seems a good amount of Control fragments will be cleared.
The two M. Leigong targets are still benefiting well from peripheral progress, and we dealt Obassi Osaw a good strike earlier. The plan this evening is to make Arietis Sector AQ-P b5-0 match it, then divert to reserving their 15% payloads. They need not actually reach 85% that way of course, but it is well to balance presenting progress with allowing the peripheral activity time to take effect, especially over a weekend.
Well done also to PDES; despite the very strong Alerts there are many complete and more underway, so thank you all for doing what you can! We will have to see how M. Leigong goes before thinking too far ahead, although notably a swift victory could lead towards INIV adopting M. Hadad again, both to unburden PDES a bit and to petition for Spire attacks there.
Right, so, I had this thought - is it possible that the progress curve for uninhabited controls was rebalanced rather than a flat boost in strength?
If it wasn’t, then that’d mean the inner control sphere at <10ly might look very differently for clearing needs, with uninhabited controls (ironically?) being ‘stronger’ than the inhabited counterpart. Also still makes for plugging the weakness of those uninhabited controls… slightly.
(I would issue that same guess/question for alerts, but a 2.5x/150% increase in strength for uninhabiteds past 20 ly would be a rather sharp rise/flattening of said curve… and, I suppose to a lesser degree, of the inhabited alerts with 60%. Also currently less easy to test than the controls?)
If it wasn’t, then that’d mean the inner control sphere at <10ly might look very differently for clearing needs, with uninhabited controls (ironically?) being ‘stronger’ than the inhabited counterpart. Also still makes for plugging the weakness of those uninhabited controls… slightly.
(I would issue that same guess/question for alerts, but a 2.5x/150% increase in strength for uninhabiteds past 20 ly would be a rather sharp rise/flattening of said curve… and, I suppose to a lesser degree, of the inhabited alerts with 60%. Also currently less easy to test than the controls?)
It is possible; before we knew that inhabited Control seems unchanged, I kept acknowledging a possible shape-change earlier here by stating the assumption that it is 30% everywhere. Three different empty Control systems agree with it thus far, at different distances but albeit within the same five-light-year segment.
We have been discussing exactly that! If true, one irksome aspect is that it would leave only 1600 space on a Fleet Carrier for the services and Tritium. A test at Col 285 Sector US-Z b14-4 would be quite good; it predicts almost exactly 100000 before (100927), so anything close to 130000 there would be quite clear!
Well, be curious to see the result. Putting aside that my brain wasn’t doing brain things yesterday and managed to mistake November 29th on a Wednesday with Thursday… I’m still not past suspecting this might potentially mark the very early beginnings of wherever the war is headed next.
Might, of course, is the key word. If I had a clue where Frontier are planning to go with things and when…
And speaking of - does anybody know of that planned ‘stability update’ said to come toward the end of this month is still on? Because we’re pretty much there, and I’ve not seen any mentions on the forums, at least…
Might, of course, is the key word. If I had a clue where Frontier are planning to go with things and when…
And speaking of - does anybody know of that planned ‘stability update’ said to come toward the end of this month is still on? Because we’re pretty much there, and I’ve not seen any mentions on the forums, at least…